I'm Trapped in a Love Triangle

[Sinful]

Hey, this is a bit complex so forgive me if it goes long. 

I'll start by giving the background story. Basically, I've been thrown into a love triangle of sorts by my now "ex" gf of 3 years, and her previous ex (now current bf), whom to the best of my knowledge she met around a year before she met me. Now here's where it gets complicated...

The previous ex, whom I'll call Big Al, lives out of the country. So they met while he was here on work/vacation. They must've really hit it off, had a great connection, and fell for one another. They spend an amazing week or 2 together and then he leaves. Life goes on for her and she starts seeing other people, I assume, as that's how I met her.

Now he travels here like twice per year. So they kept in touch, maintained enough of a long distance relationship to where he hits her up whenever he's in town, and obviously if she's not seeing anyone then they hook back up. I'm guessing this probably happens once or twice before I come into the picture based on what I now know. So he comes back to town, they hook back up and spend a week or two together and then he leaves again. A few weeks pass and she starts seeing other people, and that's how we come to meet. 

So now we start dating and at first she's not looking for anything serious she just wants to be casual, friends with benefits type of thing. But as time goes on feelings start to develop on both sides. To cut a long story short we actually ended up married and with her making me the godfather to her nephew. What I didn't know at the time.... was that she was deceiving me and hiding this long distance relationship she was maintaining with Big Al.

Now when things started to get serious between us she told me about her past relationships, but when it came to Big Al she really downplayed the whole relationship with him as more of a really good "friend" that she "had" something with in the past, but didn't even refer to him as an "ex": HUGE RED FLAG now looking back at that moment. But I was also somewhat naive at the time.  

All of a sudden, 7 months into the relationship she just completely ups and disconnects with me and breaks things off seemingly out of nowhere. I couldn't make any sense of it, and then a week later I see her posting pics on social media with Big Al, as if she's found the love of her life and talking about how special this is, etc. I was totally floored. Blindsided. I had no way of knowing cause the guy was never present. I took her word that it was just a "friend" she maintained contact with overseas. I didn't think I'd even need to be concerned about someone who doesn't even live in the country. By this time I was already caught up and had true feelings for her. So instead of walking away, like I maybe should've done, me being completely shocked and devastated I confronted her about it, and she again would deny and downplay their relationship.

For the next few months she would always lie and say there was nothing between them or anyone else. Eventually she slipped up and I caught some text messages between the two of them by accident, which had them professing their love for one another. At that point I broke it off with her, to which she seemed truly hurt by. Again, somehow we managed to get back together and it's been sort of off and on over the past 3 years now... with Big Al still in the background (or forefront) depending on how you see things. So I've been thrust into this love triangle, which she claims she's in love with us both and can't chose on or the other 🙄 .

Over the past 3 years we've been together 30 months in comparison to the say 6 months she's spent with Big Al. We broke up again at the end of Jan, which I also think was no coincidence, due to the fact that just a week or 2 later she's back with him again. At this point I'm just about done. I'm so dazed and confused now I almost don't know what to think and am not sure I'm even thinking clearly on the matter, which is why I'm asking for advice.

All this time she had me thinking that I was the one she was with and that Big Al was just some fling that was all but fizzled out. Now it looks like she's rebounding with him. Or maybe I was just the rebound?? But for 3 years!!? What the hell is going on here, and what do I do? Anyone who's been in a situation like this before would be great if you could shed some light from personal experience.

 

 

 

 

[d0nnivain]

39 minutes ago, Sinful said:

 At this point I'm just about done.

* * * 

 What the hell is going on here, and what do I do? 

 I quoted those two sentence for a reason. 

First, the title of your thread is wrong.  You are not trapped in anything.  You have the ability to walk away. Exercise that.  She may feel trapped because she has feelings for both of you but she's also playing you both.  When you get fed up with that you will walk. 

That is my second point.  What do you mean "just about done"?  She's betrayed you twice & you know it.  She settled for you because you were local & he was long distance.  Just be done already 

Third, what you do is let him have her.  She is not worth fighting for.  

All of that sucks & you are the one who gets hurt.  For that I'm sorry.  3 years down the drain is tough but you can't stay.  There is nothing for you with her.  

[BaileyB]

When people show you who they really are, you are wise to believe them. 

If fidelity is important to you, this is not your girl...

Edited March 10, 2020 by BaileyB

[Sinful]

3 hours ago, d0nnivain said:

Third, what you do is let him have her.  She is not worth fighting for.  

All of that sucks & you are the one who gets hurt.  For that I'm sorry.  3 years down the drain is tough but you can't stay.  There is nothing for you with her.  

Yeah, I know. And as much as it hurts to hear it, it's exactly what I need to hear right now. It's just so hard to come to grips with it all after being together for that long. I guess I naively thought that since we seemed to have so much together (so I thought 🙄), that there was no way she would risk our relationship for someone who comes around once or twice a year.  

I haven't contacted her since and will continue nc. I've already decided that by no means will I allow myself to be sucked back into that triangle. But what's also stressing me is that I know she's going to try to come back to me, just like before. And that just makes it even more difficult.

[Interstellar]

Get rid of her man. You already wasted three years. Think of all the beautiful women you could’ve gone out with!

Time is mankind’s greatest healer. You will get over this liar and sneak. Block and delete her from your life.

Edited March 11, 2020 by Interstellar

[Beendaredonedat]

You know she's going to come back to you?

Well, you should also know that letting her back isn't good for your emotional health.  Unless you can train yourself to be happy in the very dynamic that has you shredded right now, find your own "friend" with benefits and continue on happily in the status quo without going ape everytime "Big Al" is in town, then I suggest you divorce her and have her only respond through your attorney so you can rehab with cold turkey withdrawl from your addiction to her.

Also, and not said in malice, you would do well to get yourself into therapy to help you with your self respect and confidence.  You are a monogamous man who settled to be in a one sided polyamorous relationship.  You need to figure out why you would be so hard on yourself.  There is an underlying reason for you accepting such a thing for yourself.

FWIW:  I also think your "ex?" is addicted to her FWB which makes her rather unfit to be a monogamous partner to anyone... Al?  Well he's just a player who likely has someone like your ex in every place he visits.  If I were you, I would get STI tested asap.

Sorry you're going through this.

[Beca L]

20 hours ago, Sinful said:

To cut a long story short we actually ended up married and with her making me the godfather to her nephew.

Sorry to hear you are going through a tough time and lots of people on here understand your pain. 
Is she your GF or your wife ?? 
By the sounds of things she has never been loyal to you, even from the beginning. She has lied and kept all her eggs in one basket. Don’t you think you deserve better ? You sound young, I’m sure you could move on from this and find someone much better but I understand how hard that is. I would stay in NC and see what happens. My situation is very different to yours but I’m also in NC for the last 13 weeks. It is really tough but I don’t see what else you can do. If she wants to be with you she needs to end things for good with big Al and then come back grovelling to you. But do you want that ? Can you ever trust her again? 
Stay strong. As @BaileyB has pointed out she has shown you her true self and it isn’t very pretty. 

[Sinful]

1 hour ago, Beendaredonedat said:

Also, and not said in malice, you would do well to get yourself into therapy to help you with your self respect and confidence.  You are a monogamous man who settled to be in a one sided polyamorous relationship.  You need to figure out why you would be so hard on yourself.  There is an underlying reason for you accepting such a thing for yourself.

I don't feel I settled, it was more that I got caught up. We were almost always together. There was never any other incident or hint of infidelity on her side other than this guy. And I didn't know anything about him until 7 months in, and by then I felt like I was already in too deep. Plus being a bit blinded by my love for her, I guess part of me wanted to believe her. But you're right, I should've walked away and never looked back a long time ago. There's no way I'm going to continue with her. I totally agree with everything else... as hard as it is to hear.

Edited March 11, 2020 by Sinful

[Beendaredonedat]

5 minutes ago, Sinful said:

I don't feel I settled, it was more that I got caught up. We were almost always together. There was never any other incident or hint of infidelity on her side other than this guy. And I didn't know anything about him until 7 months in, and by then I felt like I was already in too deep.[/quote] And that is exactly why I think you could do with the professional help.  Feeling you're "in too deep" is one thing.  Having the courage and the boundaries in place will keep your head and your heart separate is another.  If anything, you should have requested she go with you to marriage counselling and her own counselling in order to get over her addiction to Al before you accepted Al into your life... which you did when you stayed/took her back without conditions.

Quote

 Plus being a bit blinded by my love for her, I guess part of me wanted to believe her. But there's no way I'm going to continue with her. I totally agree with everything else... as hard as it is to hear.

I'm sorry this has happened.  If you're having a hard time staying gone (should she try to reel you in again, then don't be afraid to get that professional help.  Hell, don't be afraid anyway.  It will help you to move on when you have unbiased clarity into the situation.

 

Edited March 11, 2020 by Beendaredonedat

[Sinful]

1 hour ago, Beca L said:

Sorry to hear you are going through a tough time and lots of people on here understand your pain. 
Is she your GF or your wife ?? 
By the sounds of things she has never been loyal to you, even from the beginning. She has lied and kept all her eggs in one basket. Don’t you think you deserve better ? You sound young, I’m sure you could move on from this and find someone much better but I understand how hard that is. I would stay in NC and see what happens. My situation is very different to yours but I’m also in NC for the last 13 weeks. It is really tough but I don’t see what else you can do. If she wants to be with you she needs to end things for good with big Al and then come back grovelling to you. But do you want that ? Can you ever trust her again? 
Stay strong. As @BaileyB has pointed out she has shown you her true self and it isn’t very pretty. 

Well, for me it wasn't a real marriage. It was more of a crazy, spur of the moment lets get married type of thing. But technically, we are still married. And you're all right. She's shown me who she truly is, and she's chosen who she wants to be with so she can stay with him. She's lost my trust at this point. It would have to be rebuilt and I'm not willing to risk my time on her anymore. It makes me wonder if any of it was real for her? I guess I'll never know. I'm just trying to stay strong with the nc so I can hopefully move forward with my life.

 

[Sinful]

19 minutes ago, Beendaredonedat said:

If anything, you should have requested she go with you to marriage counselling and her own counselling in order to get over her addiction to Al before you accepted Al into your life... which you did when you stayed/took her back without conditions.

You're 100% right. I won't let it happen again.

[Beca L]

32 minutes ago, Sinful said:

It makes me wonder if any of it was real for her? I guess I'll never know.

I think we all go through the same thinking. When you invest so much in a relationship and love deeply and then the other person betrays your trust and behaves like your WS, I think it’s just natural that you question whether or not it was real. I’m sure it was real and she is probably torn between her feelings for you both. However she should never have entered into a relationship with you when she still had feelings for big Al. She also lied to you about her true feelings for him. I’m so sorry and hope you can try and move on. 

[mark clemson]

To me this sounds like cake eating, pure and simple. She wants her marriage to you AND the option of occasional flings with OM.

She could have just asked for an open marriage/relationship but probably thought it would be a hard sell; instead she took this path and hid her sidepiece guy from you.

If it was me, I wouldn't be sticking around for this. Not after 2x - no way...

[2BGoodAgain]

hm.....

you are option B. I know this sounds strange, but you are the side piece. I know, you're married to her, and she spends most of the time with you, but let's face it.. you're option B.

How do i know, b/c she gives him the priority. Not you.

Sorry bud, but that's how it is. He is the excitement, that extra something that drives her nuts and you are ...the comfortable, reliable, doormat.

Stop being a doormat. Like the others above, you are NOT trapped in this... you are trapping yourself. Yes, you have legitimate feelings for her. That isn't in question, but a relationship takes 2 people... you are one... and she isn't.

I'm not saying what she has with the other guy is love... it is the trappings of love and whatever justification she gives it to make it justifiable to be with him. and i honestly don't believe she and him make sure neither were in relationships before hooking up; they get a high off each other... sometimes b/c they're with other people.

take nothing she says as truth. I'm not saying everything she says is a lie, but b/c there's prob a lie in every truth, it pretty much is a lie all across.

i know you'll be hurt and your feelings are involved, but if you want to protect yourself from more and more heartache... end it, and move on. Save your heart for someone worthy of it.

only you can prevent yourself  being a doormat. To rely on her to value you as a doormat is being a doormat.

good luck to you, buddy. 

[Sinful]

1 hour ago, 2BGoodAgain said:

hm.....

you are option B. I know this sounds strange, but you are the side piece. I know, you're married to her, and she spends most of the time with you, but let's face it.. you're option B.

How do i know, b/c she gives him the priority. Not you.

You know I thought about this a lot. It could be that for the entire relationship she had me totally fooled thinking that her heart was with me and that this was just some guy in the background, when in reality it was always him and I was the guy on the side (or option B as you put it). The stupidity of it all is that I wouldn't have cared if I was option B if she just would've been honest with me from the jump. Had that been the case I would've never put her as my option A, and everything would've been fine. But she deliberately deceived me and made me believe that I was the only one. 

 

2 hours ago, mark clemson said:

To me this sounds like cake eating, pure and simple. She wants her marriage to you AND the option of occasional flings with OM.

She could have just asked for an open marriage/relationship but probably thought it would be a hard sell; instead she took this path and hid her sidepiece guy from you.

If it was me, I wouldn't be sticking around for this. Not after 2x - no way...

But I even proposed that we have an open relationship and she didn't want it. She couldn't handle the idea of me being with other girls (how ironic). So she just continued the lie that there was nothing between them, and that she only wanted me.   

[S2B]

Be completely done with her!

she is a liar and a phoney.

she hasn’t been done with him and they certainly aren’t just friends!

don’t be her fool!

[S2B]

1 hour ago, S2B said:

You aren’t “trapped”

get out and don’t look back.

[HadMeOverABarrel]

On 3/11/2020 at 5:39 PM, Sinful said:

But I even proposed that we have an open relationship and she didn't want it. She couldn't handle the idea of me being with other girls (how ironic). So she just continued the lie that there was nothing between them, and that she only wanted me.   

I had a boyfriend once whom I really loved. He moved 1000 miles away for work and I caught him on a dating website. I confronted him by phone immediately, saying, "I saw your new haircut in your picture on your dating website profile, and now I'm going to start seeing other people." He apologized, begged, pleaded that I don't start seeing others, etc. Apparently what's good for the goose was not good for the gander if you asked him. That's what I think happened to you when you suggested an open relationship. She was so incredibly selfish that she wanted you all to herself while she still gets to sample the other candy. That's why she said no to an open relationship. She's a selfish little twit and you deserve much better. I hope you find the better that you deserve! 

[Sinful]

34 minutes ago, HadMeOverABarrel said:

That's what I think happened to you when you suggested an open relationship. She was so incredibly selfish that she wanted you all to herself while she still gets to sample the other candy. That's why she said no to an open relationship. She's a selfish little twit and you deserve much better. I hope you find the better that you deserve! 

I totally agree! She's extremely selfish and immature. I deserve way better and will not be wasting anymore of my time on her. 

[Sinful]

Well the pieces of the puzzle are slowly falling into place now. In a moment of boredom and weakness I started browsing social media again and up pops a pic of my ex all smiling and so in love together with the guy she left me for. In the 3 yrs we were together not once did she ever post pics of us like that together. It's now obvious that they had a much deeper relationship than I ever knew about, and that she secretly maintained the relationship with him for the entire 3 years we were together. I now believe this was something that she/they had planned out for quite some time, and she was just biding her time and waiting for this LDR to become local so she could drop me and effectively jump ship to be with him.

Why she allowed her sick game to go as far as it did with me... marrying me and bringing me into her family I'll never know. I encourage anyone who feels down because they've been wronged by someone in a relationship to read my story. No matter how bad you may think you have it or how badly you feel you have been wronged, there's not many people who have been betrayed to the level that my ex betrayed me. This was someone I truly loved and thought loved me too, but ultimately she just used me to fill a void created by her LDR and when she was done using me simply chose to discard me like yesterdays trash.   

[S2B]

On 3/12/2020 at 4:51 PM, Sinful said:

I totally agree! She's extremely selfish and immature. I deserve way better and will not be wasting anymore of my time on her. 

Did you file for divorce yet?

[Sinful]

34 minutes ago, S2B said:

Did you file for divorce yet?

I want the marriage annulled if possible. I'm gathering all the evidence to turn over to my attorney.

[oldtruck]

On 3/27/2020 at 12:48 PM, Sinful said:

Well the pieces of the puzzle are slowly falling into place now. In a moment of boredom and weakness I started browsing social media again and up pops a pic of my ex all smiling and so in love together with the guy she left me for. In the 3 yrs we were together not once did she ever post pics of us like that together. It's now obvious that they had a much deeper relationship than I ever knew about, and that she secretly maintained the relationship with him for the entire 3 years we were together. I now believe this was something that she/they had planned out for quite some time, and she was just biding her time and waiting for this LDR to become local so she could drop me and effectively jump ship to be with him.

Why she allowed her sick game to go as far as it did with me... marrying me and bringing me into her family I'll never know. I encourage anyone who feels down because they've been wronged by someone in a relationship to read my story. No matter how bad you may think you have it or how badly you feel you have been wronged, there's not many people who have been betrayed to the level that my ex betrayed me. This was someone I truly loved and thought loved me too, but ultimately she just used me to fill a void created by her LDR and when she was done using me simply chose to discard me like yesterdays trash.   

she kept you to be he beta provider and to fill in for when the OM was out of the country

truth hurts but be grateful you now found out her lies so you can protect yourself. dump her

[Sinful]

So, I don't believe the OM knows about me, and I have an opportunity to inform him about her cheating ways. Should I reach out to him and let him know the truth with all the evidence, or should I just forget the whole thing and let her continue with her destruction? I don't want to come off as if I'm jaded and my motive for doing such would be revenge. I would make it clear that I don't want her back and just want him to know the truth of her ways. I'm so confused right now. What should I do?

[oldtruck]

i think that the OM would not care. for him your WW is just a vacation side piece.

someone to give him releases when he leaves  his main woman back in the old

country.

 

i would do a social media search on the OM. i would not be surprised that he

is married or in a long term relationship.